Video game review sites -- suggestions please

Cafe Society
21

You could search the Lionhead forums, but when I searched, every thread had “That’s been discussed in a dozen threads already,” instead of just answering the damn question. Closest I’ve been able to find is this, but I don’t know how accurate that is:

A version of Microsoft® Windows® 98SE/ME/2000/XP

• Pentium® III 800MHz or Athlon™ 800MHz processor or higher

• 256MB RAM

• 8x Speed CD-ROM drive and latest drivers

• 100% DirectX® 9.0c compatible 16-bit sound card and latest drivers

• 100% Windows® 98SE/ME/2000/XP compatible mouse, keyboard and latest drivers

• DirectX® 9.0c

• A T&L capable video card with at least 32 MB of video RAM and one of the supported chipsets

ATI® Radeon® series (7000 or better).
7000, 7200, 7500.
8500
9000, 9200, 9250, 9550, 9600, 9700, 9800.
X300, X600, X700, X800, X850

NVIDIA® GeForce® series (GeForce 2 or better).
GeForce 2, MX, Ti, GTS, Ultra
GeForce 3, 3 Ti.
GeForce 4, MX, Ti
GeForce FX 5200, 5600, 5700, 5800, 5900, PCX 5300, 5750, 5950
GeForce 6200, 6600, 6800.

300MB of uncompressed free hard disk space (plus 100MB for Windows® swap file)

I also read “If you can play The Sims 2, you should be able to play The Movies.” Still no clue how accurate that might be.

22

Thanks; if those are accurate I’ll be fine. Still, I am a little mystified that it’s so hard to track the requirements down. How many people are just pre-ordering the game without having a clear idea what the system reqs are?

23

My guess is that if they’re into PC gaming enough to follow upcoming games, a lot of them will have top of the line computers.

24

Many gamers (like me) keep their systems constantly up to date (though certainly not bleeding edge – I’m not made of money). e.g. adding more memory every couple years, new graphics card every year, new processor every couple years, etc.

Essentially there will never be a game out there I can’t play. It’s really a matter of how well it’ll play. I know for a fact that I’m not alone. For that info, you really need testing and benchmarks. In that sense, game “requirements” are essentially going out the window. An awesome game like Half-Life 2 shows minimum requirements as:

1.2 GHz Processor
256MB RAM
DirectX 7 compatible graphics card
…

Kinda silly, IMHO.
I’ve heard about a gaming initiative afoot at Microsoft that includes (among other things) getting rid of written system requirements on the side of a box, but instead putting some kind of colored stripe, whose color would signify the tech necessary for the game. They were talking about this on of the recent installments of the PC Gamer Podcast, run by the senior editors of PC Gamer magazine.

25

That would be the Microsoft Game Advisor, which is operating right now. It only has released games, so The Movies doesn’t make the cut, but it looks like it’ll be pretty helpful on the “Can my computer run this?” front.

By the by, I write for a biggest little site you’ve never heard of, Gaming Target and we do plenty of reviews.

But honestly, if I were to recommend just one site to somebody for reviews it would be Game Rankings, a Rotten Tomatoes site for games before Rotten Tomatoes did games. They are by far the most complete metareview site and there’s plenty of good reviews rated as such by the GR readers.

26

“The Movies” system specs (from the site):

The Movies™ Minimum System Requirements:

  • A version of Microsoft® Windows® 98SE/ME/2000/XP
  • Pentium® III 800 MHz or Athlon™ 800MHz processor or higher
  • 256MB RAM
  • 8x Speed CD-ROM drive and latest drivers
  • 2.4 GB of uncompressed free hard disk space (plus 500MB for Windows® swap file)
  • 100% DirectX® 9.0c compatible 16-bit sound card and latest drivers
  • 100% Windows® 98SE/ME/2000/XP compatible mouse, keyboard and latest drivers
  • DirectX® 9.0c (included)
  • Updated Windows Media® Player 9 Codecs (included)
  • 800 x 600 Monitor Resolution
  • 3D Hardware Accelerator Card required - 100% DirectX® 9.0c compatible 32MB Hardware T&L-capable video card and latest drivers*

Supported Graphics Cards:
ATI™ Radeon® series (7000 or better).
7000, 7200, 7500
8500
9000, 9200, 9250, 9550, 9600, 9700, 9800
x300, x600, x700, x800, x850

NVIDIA® GeForce® series (GeForce 3 or better).
GeForce 3, 3 Ti
GeForce 4, MX, Ti
GeForce FX 5200, 5600, 5700, 5800, 5900, PCX 5300, 5750, 5950
GeForce 6200, 6600, 6800

Important Note: *Some 3D accelerator cards with the chipsets listed here may not be compatible with the 3D acceleration features utilized by The Movies™. Please refer to your hardware manufacturer for 100% DirectX 9.0c compatibility.

Online Requirements: Internet (TCP/IP) supported Online content requires broadband connection and the latest drivers.

27

I can’t even begin to imagine the joy in playing this game on a P3 800Mhz, running WinME, with 256megs of RAM, and a GeForce3 32MB.

28

In a weird way, those specs worry me… One thing about the Sims 2’s fairly demanding system requirements was that I felt assured it would be a beautiful game graphically. If, as Jayrot points out, this game would even run on a “P3 800Mhz, running WinME, with 256megs of RAM, and a GeForce3 32MB”, how good are the graphics going to be?

Maybe I won’t be such an early adopter on this one and wait for one of you guinea pigs to try it out before I buy :wink:

29

Based on screenshots and movies I’ve seen, the graphics are average at best. They certainly aren’t the best I’ve seen, but they’re not the worst, either. This won’t bother me, however, so I’m probably not your best guinea pig. :slight_smile: